


i'm not here (no one is here)

by Pure_Anon



Category: Anastasia - Flaherty/Ahrens/McNally
Genre: :), Alternate Universe - Ghosts, Angst, F/M, Gen, Hurt No Comfort, I wrote this because people wrote a lot of Ghost Gleb fics that hurt me., Originally Posted in 2018, Originally Posted on Tumblr, Pining, So I decided to hurt them back by writing Ghost Anya., Suicidal Thoughts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-22
Updated: 2020-11-22
Packaged: 2021-03-10 02:55:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,297
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27676384
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Pure_Anon/pseuds/Pure_Anon
Summary: Gleb returns to Russia with Anya's blood on his hands.He does not return alone.
Relationships: Anya | Anastasia Romanov & Gleb Vaganov, Anya | Anastasia Romanov/Gleb Vaganov
Comments: 4
Kudos: 16





	1. Chapter 1

Gleb comes back to Russia with Anya’s blood on his hands and an emptiness in his eyes.

His superiors commend him for doing an excellent job and drop hints about a promotion.

(They don’t know how he cradled her dying body in his arms, how he frantically tried to press life back into her.)

His comrades take him out for drinks, despite his protests. They introduce him to a pretty blonde girl and laugh amongst themselves at Gleb blanching and running away. They always knew Vaganov couldn’t talk to girls, for all his good looks, they say.

(He violently empties his stomach, throwing up until only dry hacking remains. He hates himself for being affected like this, but he can’t shake the image of Anya crumbled to the ground.)

His coworkers gossip about how much stricter Vaganov has become since his return. He barely leaves the office anymore, they say, and he never shows any mercy.

(They don’t know that throwing himself into his work is the only way to prevent himself from breaking.)

At night he dreams of her. Sometimes she comes to him as a corpse, her skin festering, her dress splattered with dried blood, and her beautiful eyes full of maggots. He wakes up screaming after those nights.

Other times she comes to him as she was in life, except with eyes full of love for him. He opens his arms to her and he is _happy_. He wakes up shaking and reaching for her after those dreams.

(He isn’t sure which type of dream is worse.)

One night, she visits him in the waking world.

Gleb wakes up shaking and sweaty, his breathing erratic as he attempts to calm himself. Then he looks up and she’s _there_.

He doesn’t move a muscle as he stares at her. She appears as she did in life, except, for a terrible bloodless bullet hole. He can barely look at her, because she’s here and he’s missed her so much, and maybe he can apologize, maybe he can repent —

She breathes his name, and the spell is broken. She’s never spoken in his dreams, and he can’t take it, he can’t take judgement from her, so beautiful and terrible all at once. His stomach contracts painfully and he retches.

When he looks up, she’s gone and he feels empty.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As I said in the notes, I originally wrote this in 2018. I was fifteen then, and new at writing. I edited this fic a bit before posting it, but I did not rewrite it. Although rereading my old work makes me cringe, I am proud that I have come so far, and I still like this fic and its concept. I hope you like it as well.


	2. Chapter 2

It’s only when summer has started bleeding into fall that he sees her again.

Gleb restrains muffled sobs with a shaking hand as he leans against a wall, the rough bricks digging into his back.

(There’s no one here to see him, yet he still can’t seem to just let himself cry.)

It had only been an hour ago that he’d felt alive, for once. He and another officer had been chasing a woman who had evaded the Soviets for far too long. With his blood racing as he rushed through the crowded streets, he’d felt whole.

( ~~Almost.~~ )

They’d finally cornered her, and he had prepared to make the arrest only —

She’d looked at him and he’d fallen apart, for those eyes were so like _hers_. They held the same gleam of defiance, and they were almost the same shade of blue. She stared at him, and he couldn’t breathe. He was trapped, held by the sins of his past.

(He had thought he was getting better at handling this. He hardly flinched at all nowadays, why now, _goddamnit_.)

The sharp crack of a gun had brought him out of his reverie, and he was only able to watch in horror as his fellow officer shot her down.

(The sight of the light fading from her eyes was so horribly _familiar_.)

He’d kept it together long enough to return and make a report (his fellow _comrade_ would be facing consequences for his hasty act), and then he had run.

(He had ran until his heart felt like it was bursting, ran until he couldn’t run anymore, and he had fallen, gasping for air against a rough wall.)

Gleb wipes his eyes, his breath still erratic and his hands still shaky, but he means to go back until he looks up and sees _her_.

(All he can think is _red_. Red like the leaves falling around her, red like her dress, and red like how her blood had been.)

He falls on his knees before her, crumpling as waves of guilt and regret wash over him. He can’t tear his eyes away from her, even now.

She moves towards him, falling gracefully to his level, and then she gently touches his face, a feather-light touch he doubts he would have noticed if he had not seen her do it. Their eyes meet and he can’t breathe.

(He doesn’t know how long they stay there, the murderer and the ghost, but it’s ~~not long enough~~ too long.)

A truck backfires near them, and she dissolves like mist into the cold air. Gleb stands up and exhales a shaky breath. He can still feel the touch of her fingers.

(This, of course, is only the catalyst.)

It starts small. He catches flashes of red in the corner of his eyes, or a glint of blue eyes in a crowd, things he can almost pretend mean nothing. Then she starts to appear to him all the time, clear and distinct, and he can no longer pretend. She walks with him on patrols, is in the crowd when he speaks, and sits staring out at the Neva as he works.

(He doesn’t dare ask her why she’s doing this, and she doesn’t tell him.)

He avoids looking at her at first, recoils when he catches her gaze, but gradually, he starts to drink in the sight of her. He imprints the image of her indelibly underneath his eyelids, inside his mind, and within his heart.

(He knows he’s too much of a coward to pull the trigger, so he tortures himself day by day in this fashion, killing himself little by little every time he looks at her and that terrible hole upon her temple.)

He grows pale and wan, but his work grows ever better, so his superiors say nothing, He sleeps little, and when he does, it’s upon his kitchen table, his head supported by the piles of work he brought with him.

One night, he dreams he’s Orpheus and she’s Eurydice. He walks carefully through the underworld, and does not turn back until they’re both out. He turns to her, flushed with happiness, and she grabs his wrist and drags him down below again, then he’s falling, falling, fall —

He awakens with a jolt and a startled cry. Her hand is stopped in midair, as if she was going to reach out to him but thought better of it Somehow, that simple motion is enough to break all his defenses.

“Why?” he asks, and that simple syllable somehow seems to contain all his grief and questions.

(It doesn’t escape him that this is the first time he’s spoken to her since Paris.)

The word hangs heavy in the air between them, and he regrets having said anything. He turns to go, but a sharp “Wait!” startles him into stopping.

“I am nothing, just a shadow,” she says, and the moonlight shines on her in a way that makes her translucent, “I don’t know why I’m here, why in death I seem drawn to you, but our enmity is _past_ , Gleb. I can’t hold on to my anger in this form, most of my feelings seem cloudy, and softened. They slip away from me if I do not hold them tight,“ her face is strained as if talking this much is painful, but she continues on, “I need you to — to forgive yourself,”

Gleb smiles, a bitter and broken thing, “How?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter was originally posted at https://nanasalt.tumblr.com/post/179633826481/im-not-hereno-one-is-here-22

**Author's Note:**

> As I said in the tags, I originally wrote this in 2018. I was fifteen then, so I hope my writing has improved since then. I edited this fic when posting it on ao3, but I did not rewrite it entirely. Although reading my old work makes me cringe, I was proud of it then and I am still proud of it now. I hope you enjoyed reading it!
> 
> If you want to read the original, it is posted at https://nanasalt.tumblr.com/post/174713932466/im-not-hereno-one-is-here-1-possibly


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